


the only ones left

by nimrodcracker



Series: i'll sleep with the stars tonight [6]
Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Dealing With Trauma, F/F, Friendship/Love, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Health Issues, Mutual Pining, Oneshot, Slow Burn, why do i keep writing sad things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-12 03:58:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12950811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nimrodcracker/pseuds/nimrodcracker
Summary: team milky way to shepley; from eden prime till earth.





	the only ones left

**Author's Note:**

> can't stop won't stop writing about these two because clearly, i will go down with this ship (oh look! a poor attempt to rationalise my unceasing love for these two. ok fine, anything to fill up the ship tag)
> 
> consider this a general summary of all my shepley fics. (for a happy ending, check out postscript).

What's so special being a marine?

Everyone talks about the glamour and prestige of being a marine - heck, even being  _part_  of the Alliance military is enough to get showered with respect and drinks on the house at any bar that's worth their booze. They've walked into enough joints decked out in their fatigues to know how deep that deference goes.

Kaidan thinks it's 'cause their faces are plastered all over the extranet after Eden Prime, but Ash tells him to stop spoiling the fun.

Good thing Shepard doesn't drink; she's the one who bails all their asses -  _read:_  drags out by the scruff of their collars - when they drink too much to walk straight. But damn, the drills she puts the crew through the morning after?  _Brutal_.

Everyone talks about war like they know how it happens. Guns blazing, sweeping adrenaline and medals hanging heavy on their dress uniforms. A sight to behold, and memories to keep.

Everyone doesn't talk about that one thought, though. When you swear your oaths, you swear to die.

The three of them know that better than anyone.

_

After Eden Prime, they become inseparable.

Forged in fire and forged by steel; the Prothean beacon the final link that fuses them together. Defying death and catastrophic odds tends to do that - and the next time the Normandy lands on the Citadel, they crash the nearest bar till they're kicked out for getting involved in a bar brawl.

Three marines against the galaxy, geth and a rogue spectre. What's not love? In a way, it's almost romantic, deserving of an equally romantic ending.

But there's nothing romantic about one point of their trinity blazing out in nuclear fire.

_

"Take care of her," Kaidan says to Ashley once, when the mess hall is empty and the sleeping pods full up. "She forgets that she's still human, sometimes. Bearing the weight of a galaxy's expectations, and self-flagellating over the decisions she can't possibly make - it's going to kill her someday."

"'Course I will, LT," Ashley says to Kaidan then, not quite following the sudden turn in conversation. Not quite able to reconcile Kaidan's assessment of Shepard with the woman in her head. "She's my CO, and a fine one at that."

"Take care of her," Kaidan says to Shepard once, when explosions rock the breeding facility and static fizzles over their private comm channel. "She forgets that she's still human, sometimes. Her family name isn't the only thing that defines her."

"I will," Shepard says to Kaidan then, all emotion drained from her tone. All emotion that's crushed into a tangled ball she can't stand to unwind right now. "I swear it."

_

It's bittersweet, the way they reply him.

They don't know it yet, but they're good for each other. He sees the mutual respect beneath the flashes of antagonism, the longing looks cast each other's way when they thought no one was watching. Most of all, he notes the flickers of themselves reflected in each other.

They don't know it yet, but they inspire each other to  _be_  better - without turning it into a competition.

That comforts Kaidan in his last moments, a fleeting reprieve from the gunfire peppering the back of the parapet that shields him. So much that he misses the rumbling, the warning before the  _flash-_

-that Shepard can't watch, knowing how she left a dear friend behind. Knowing how the marines of the 8th Frontier Division came for her as she tottered between life and death on Akuze's flatlands.

Knowing that she's glad Kaidan's dead and Ashley's alive.

It's not her fault. Cognitively, Shepard's well aware of that. She did the best she could in a demanding combat situation.

But there's bile in her throat as she shuts her eyes, her palms flattened against the glass of the window.

_

Three points now collapse into two.

_

You'd think Virmire was enough of a shocker - and a big-ass nuclear explosion at that - to knock enough sense into them that anything more than camaraderie is a fucked-up mess of fraternisation and attachment. Feelings muddle up command decisions, and muddled-up command decisions lead to dead soldiers. They've managed to side-step that because they're so damned good at their jobs; that no matter what crap the galaxy throws at them, no one dies.

But nobody's bulletproof, and neither are they.

Every decision is beset by the fear that they'll never see each other again. You'd think they'd be used to it, being soldiers, but they forget they're better liars than marines.

Ash sugarcoats her insecurities. Shepard minimises her mental struggles. Both of them have enough anguish to fill a cargo bay, and even sink the damned ship that carries them.

Yet, they make it work. Whatever it is. It's not a relationship, nor is it friendship. It's something,  _everything_ , yet nothing at the same time.

The two of them tell themselves it's inevitable. Closing ranks, just like another military manoeuvre. They're marines enough to know that. That's why they end up sharing quarters the night before Ilos, because they just... needed someone around. Talking late into the night, filling the aching stillness of probable doom with civilian talk.

Ashley came in intent on apologising for yelling at Shepard some days before - but she hadn't expected to stay.

The morning after isn't awkward; even if Shepard's particular about personal boundaries, even if Ashley's breaking fraternisation regs just by being here, waking up on Shepard's couch. She stirs with a blanket she doesn't remember using draped on her - and when she glances at Shepard's made-up bed, it's missing a blanket.

They're just doing what they've always done. With Kaidan gone, they need each other more than ever.

After the battle of the Citadel, they start falling for each other.

But that's not what they call it.

They're just closing ranks.

_

You'd think that separation - heck,  _death_  - would make the heart grow fonder. But they're lovers of literature enough to be cringing instead at the cliche.

Shepard acts like Ashley's rejection on Horizon doesn't affect her. Because it doesn't. Right? She doesn't love Ashley in that sense, so it doesn't make sense to bombard the Ops Chief with apology emails over the extranet. Especially since she made it clear that Shepard was filthier than the gunk inside unclean rifles for joining up with Cerberus.

Still, Shepard types page after page meant for Ashley, jumbled thoughts spilling forth in search of a place to exist, finding permanence as letters on a terminal screen.

But she doesn't press 'send'. Neither does she press 'delete'. So they sit in her drafts, clogging up her terminal like the baggage she drags around in self-imposed penance. Waiting for the spark of recklessness that characterises her fearlessness in battle - but not her personal life.

An entire week after their ill-fated meeting, she does.

_

Shepard, being Shepard, replies to Ashley's message in her usual curtness that Ashley figures she's royally fucked up with her skipper once again.

That's why the next time they speak is a whole year later on Earth, mere seconds before Shepard's trial.

That's why the tiniest of smiles from each of them leave them smiling for the rest of the day; a smile not even Reapers can wipe clean.

_

You'd think they'd realised something, the way their first meeting on Horizon went down. Shepard's staggering, silent relief to Ashley's blinding fury. It's the sentiment that's left unsaid - why did they care so much?

By the time Ashley realises, Shepard's halfway through the Omega-4 Relay.

As for Shepard, she doesn't. Not until Ashley's lying deathly still on a bed in Huerta. Even then, it's Thane who shapes unacknowledged feelings into words; words that linger in her heart as she dodges a Destroyer's laser and Brutes in search of Mordin.

_You love her more than you do yourself, and that's why you yet live._

_

Whenever Ashley wakes, there's always some hint of a visitor left in her ward.

The faint whiff of gun oil, the chairs arranged in a line to face the window. Then, a vacuum flask of hot hibiscus tea on her bedside table, her duffel of belongings in the bottom drawer.

Someone must've placed them there, and Ashley's pretty certain on who that person is - but she doesn't dare hope. Not with how things ended between them these few years.

Ashley's glad her face muscles are still too sore to move, no thanks to the bruises mottling her cheeks. Because when her doctor mentions in passing that Shepard's been around;  _too around_  being how they phrased it, her mind halts. Her hand, reaching for said hibiscus tea, stills mid-air.

"Lieutenant-Commander?" Her doctor peers at her curiously, fingers hovering over the datapad in hand.

"I'm fine. It's just-"  _she came!_  "-a sudden crick in my bones."

The doctor leaves her to stew, because Ashley doesn't speak again until her hibiscus tea is drained. She sets her drink back on her side table, but jerks her gaze up at the sound of the door  _whooshing_  open.

She can't believe her eyes.

_

"Glad to see you're up, Williams."

"Glad to see you're not dead, Shepard."

And just like that, it's as if Cerberus and time had never separated them at all.

_

You'd think almost shooting each other in the name of duty would've pummelled them into revealing their feelings for each other, but that's being hopelessly optimistic for two stubborn jarheads.

Feelings muddle up command decisions, and muddled-up command decisions lead to dead soldiers. They've managed to side-step that because they're so damned good at their jobs; that no matter what crap the galaxy throws at them, no one dies.

But the Reapers take, take,  _take_  so many from them.

Ashley can't explain the helplessness, listening in to team comms from the CIC. Some missions, her skipper had insisted Ashley remain on the ship -  _better to lose one officer than both_ , Shepard had said,  _when things go south_  - but her place had always been by Shepard's side. Guns out, chins up, and steel in their gaze. Alliance soldiers till death.

Naturally, there's the unmistakable hypervigilance: every explosion making Ashley shudder, her whole self attuned to the inflections of Shepard's voice. If Shepard dies -  _God forbid_  - Ashley will captain the Normandy.

She won't just lose her CO. She'll lose her north star.

Shepard can't explain the frigid ice in her veins, sending Ashley off for various missions unknown. Some missions, she wonders just how she managed manipulating her fellow Spectre into acquiescence -  _I'll even follow you to the depths of hell_ , Ashley had said,  _because I trust you_  - but Shepard receives nothing in return but unquestioning obedience. Everyone defers to her, her being commander and all, but even her fellow Spectre and Lieutenant Commander. They're equals in the things that matter, and yet.

Two years after Saren and the geth, and Shepard still hesitates,  _hesitates_ \- for a fraction of a second too long: the chilling fear that her orders are a condemnation to death. If Ashley dies -  _please, God, no_  - Shepard won't.  _Can't_  captain the Normandy alone.

She won't just lose her XO. She'll lose her north star.

_

You'd think that Shepard dropping hints about indoctrination would've frightened Ashley off, because who in their right mind would trust someone this... _damaged_ , right? Someone who's a few whispers away from going berserk, whose head is filled with memories and ciphers that don't belong in a human's head?

(They can't hurt her if she makes them leave or keeps them out, Shepard's always believed. Abandonment is a fear rooted in her soul like a sturdy, aging oak - just as her defenses have become part of her.)

But that's what Shepard believed. And in matters of the heart, Shepard's wrong as usual.

That's why her fellow Spectre takes that as invitation to fuss over her. "How are you doing? Feeling alright today? Skipper, have you been  _skipping_  meals again?"

It annoys Shepard at times. Of  _course_  she can take care of herself. Dwelling on banal observations of her condition is pointless, not when Reapers blot out the stars in the vastness of space.

But if Shepard's being honest with herself, her irritation stems from discomfort. Because she's rarely asked that. Because she doesn't  _know_  how to react towards unconditional affection. Anderson was bad enough, but this?

But because it's Ashley, Shepard takes it in with a strained smile and doesn't bolt at first opportunity.

_

A mistake,  _mistake_  letting Ashley come close. A mistake to let Ashley see her hurting when the galaxy sees otherwise.

But Ash doesn't shy away from confrontation, and that's what it amounts to - sentences, ringing off the walls of the Life Support Room.

"It hurts me to see you like this, skipper, because you conveniently forget that you're still human. That you  _deserve_  to be forgiven and to be loved!"

Shepard doesn't notice her own tears streaking down her face till Ashley gently wipes them away with her thumbs. Her touch is searing, even against hot tears.

And that's why Shepard doesn't talk about her emotions.  _Can never_  talk about her emotions. Who can, once they've learnt to repress them to stave off a psychotic break?

They don't spend more time together, because they already are. Have been, ever since the near-fatal shootout on the Citadel. But Shepard's unbalanced by how it feels...different, now. There's a lightness in being uninhibited, genuine - not just in intention but also in action.

She doesn't have to hide anymore.

_

"You make me feel worth it," Shepard says in passing, when it's just them in starboard observation: on a couch, a bottle between them, and the stars beyond that stretch into infinity. Rannoch is stark against the blackness of space, without the usual ring of Reapers in orbit thanks to Shepard's planetside stunt yesterday.

"Funny," Ashley responds. Her eyes twinkle from the buzz of drink, and her hand is warm in Shepard's grasp. "I was about to say the same thing to you."

Shepard's eyes flick to Ashley's lips,  _longing_  to give in to the wave of feeling-

-but doesn't.

Because it's Ashley who presses a kiss to Shepard's cheek first, before nestling her head on Shepard's shoulder.

By the time sense returns to Shepard, she sees the gentle rise-n-fall of Ashley's chest; enough to give Shepard pause.

So Shepard does nothing. Just lets herself sink into the couch, hoping that sleep will come tonight. Even if she's unused to the warmth of another body pressing into her, and the knowledge that it's  _Ashley_  of all people.

That's how they wake the next morning, and Ashley thankfully doesn't remember what she did.

_

A mistake, yes.

A regret, no.

Shepard cannot regret what they share, whatever it is. Not when she knows, in her hearts of hearts, that the times spent with Ashley have given her more peace than she's ever known.

_

Shepard is slipping.

It's obvious, really - at least to Ashley - when she spends less time on the crew decks and more in her cabin. When her bottles of sports drinks are unopened and woefully neglected in the common refrigeration unit. But Shepard's always taken failure badly, and if there's anything that can stagger that juggernaut of a woman, it's her automatic, self-defeating thoughts.

After the incident on Thessia, Ashley can't really blame her CO.

Shepard dismisses that observation with a firm  _No_  that's barely convincing, not even to the Normandy's resident AI. Any attempts to coax her otherwise fall on deaf ears, so James invites her to the shuttle bay for a friendly spar.

It doesn't go well. James -  _sturdy, built-like-a-Mako_  James - is handed his own ass by a biotic with muscles half his size.  _Without_  biotics. His bruises are sore enough to show as mottled blue-black on his jaw and arms that Ashley steps in out of pity because there's no way Shepard's about to stop now.

It's not the thought of sparring that terrifies Ashley. It's the deranged expression her CO wears, teeth bared and a not-quite-here look in her eyes due to the adrenaline kicking in; an expression that clears up when Shepard has Ashley pinned to the ground with an arm across her neck.

Horror is what Shepard feels first, and a panicked  _sorry_  is what tumbles out of her mouth next. By then, there's enough wind knocked out of Ashley that she can just manage a keening whine as Shepard scrambles to her feet, pressure vanishing from Ashley's chest.

"Wow, Lola. Talk about fighting rough." James isn't as relaxed as he sounds, his eyes darting between the two Spectres in front of him. Yet, he doesn't step in.

Shepard doesn't register his words; his  _presence_ , even, her wide-eyed gaze fixed squarely on the woman whose throat she almost crushed. "I'm sorry, Ash. I'm so,  _so_  sorry."

For a moment - a fleeting,  _terrifying_  moment - Ashley almost thought Shepard would end her. A thought that makes her turn to James, too ashamed to face a guilt-ridden friend -  _only?_  - who's already self-flagellating for letting herself be consumed by her fury.

But Ash isn't one to twist the knife. She holds out a hand which Shepard grasps, gingerly, before pulling her up to her feet. They're standing too close for Ashley not to feel the anxiety roll off Shepard in waves, amplified no less by the fact that she's a biotic, and biotics always felt an ocean's worth when others just felt a lake. Something to do with being sensitive enough to be in tune with normally-undetectable mass effect fields, if Ashley remembers right.

And Ashley remembers how she hasn't said a word to Shepard yet.

It shows, really. In the way Shepard's back is rigid, her hands hovering hesitant over Ashley's arms - as if fearing the thought of touching Ashley. Hands of stone, hands that shatter all that it grasps. A person bracing themselves for the stinging finality of rejection from going too far.

 _Screw that_ , Ashley thinks.  _Screw all that._  So she does what she's always done for Shepard - she bites down the aches in her body to gather the taller woman down in a standing hug.

"You'll be okay, Mia," Ashley exhales, thumb ghosting circles on Shepard's damp tank top. "You'll be okay."

Shepard only shivers in her arms, fingers digging into the cloth of Ashley's fatigues; her comforting embrace, a soft place to land.

Where the shuttle bay once was a hive of chittering electronics and pockets of conversation, it now is as quiet as the war-touched cliffs of Menae.

_

"Never do that again," Ashley bites out, her relief still drowning under waves of fear, when their shuttle hurtles through the sky of 2181 Despoina.

What's unsaid sits between them in the air - in Ashley's too-firm grip on Shepard's thigh, in Shepard's unwillingness to meet Ashley's pointed look.

_I can't lose you again._

Shepard, trembling from the deathly chill that's settled in the corners of her soul, doesn't answer. Just a quirk of her lips, a shake of her head.

"I hope so too," Shepard coughs out, water still clogging her lungs. But Ashley doesn't laugh. In fact, nobody does. Not Cortez, not even James.

Death has long stopped being a joke.

_

It doesn't occur to Ashley how the crew will talk, the way she often finds herself at Shepard's door.

(They do, of course, but from what James tells her, it ranges from surprise to gushing over how they're a good fit for each other. Embarrassingly so.)

Shepard only ever lingers in three places aboard the Normandy: her quarters, the life support room, or the library at the starboard viewing deck. But Ashley doesn't see her anywhere on the crew deck.

"Skipper?"

A beat, maybe four. Only then does Shepard react. Not even a turn of her head, just the droop of her tensed shoulders, as she towered over the datapads arranged all over the surface of her desk. With her back facing Ashley, Ashley can only guess about the feelings splayed out across Shepard's expression. Shepard might've mean the gesture as acknowledgement, but Ashley can't help but read it as defeat.

The bottle is heavy in her grasp when Ashley sidles up to Shepard, where she nudges the woman on the shoulder - to no response.

"Mia, talk to me," Ashley says, placing the bottle on Shepard's desk. "I'm worried about you. We're all worried about you."

Again, a beat - and a suppressed flinch, if Ashley's not imagining things. "I'm fine."

"Funny how I don't believe that."

Shepard huffs, mussed purple hair bobbing along. "It's the truth."

"I'm here, Mia. You can talk to me." Ashley tugs Shepard by the wrist, thinking of leading her to the couch, but Shepard wraps a bony hand around Ashley's; a non-verbal  _no_.

"There's no time." Shepard finally looks square at Ashley - cheekbones poking through skin, eyelids twitching for lack of sleep. "Next time."

"I'm not sure there's a next time, Mia."

In two days, they leave hyperspace to reach Cronos Station. In three, they enter hyperspace to make the final jump to Earth.

In four, or five, the Milky Way's fate is sealed.

Shepard's grip around Ashley's wrist tightens, enough to dig painfully into skin. But Ashley doesn't yelp or shake her hand off. Ashley only looks on at Shepard's expression, face now as pale as Noveria's snow - and for dark-skinned women like the both of them, that's drastic.

"Ash." Shepard whispers.  _Pleads_. "Don't say that. Don't court death."

Ashley wants to snort, to laugh till her lungs are ripped apart at the absurdity of their reversal of roles. Not even drink can mess up her insides like this.

She wriggles her hand out of Shepard's grasp with a smile, before gathering Shepard's hands in hers. Warm, and callused. "Coming from  _you_ , Mia? I think I just struck gold."

"Ash, I-"

"-need a break. A quick one won't hurt. You've been cooped in here for an entire day."

"Oh." Shepard blinks, twice. " _Oh_." Her gaze drops to their linked hands; her hands slack in the protective cocoon of Ashley's hands. "I hadn't noticed."

"You're stressed about the battle. I get that. The 'working your ass off till you collapse' bit you love doing? It's showing."

"Guilty as charged. Just-" Shepard squeezes her eyes shut, her entire body moving with her long-suffering exhale. Then, a murmur. "I want to sleep, Ash. I'm exhausted. But..."

"The nightmares."

" _If_  I can fall asleep." Shepard winces. "No, I can't relax. I can't bear to lift even a finger, but my mind's on overdrive."

"I know the feeling," Ashley echoes, thinking of the nights after the SR-1; just waiting for the walls to explode in flames when she lays on her bed. The flashbacks stopped years ago, but the startle reflex hasn't quite left her.

That's why she knows better than to suggest sleep again - heck, or even a look-over by Chakwas - because they've been through this. Shepard, screaming as she tumbles into wakefulness, and EDI pinging Ashley loud enough for her to rush to Shepard's quarters with a sweater hastily pulled on and boots with laces left untied. The very first time, Ashley found herself staring down the barrel of Shepard's Carnifex - but since then, firearm accidents stopped being a possibility. Shepard just stopped sleeping with a pistol under her pillow. (She doesn't realise Shepard stopped after she started coming by.)

Maybe, presence is all they can offer to stave off their demons. "Skipper, you know I'm just two decks away, right? If you ever needed company."

"I know, but I can't. Not without feeling like a burden."

There. The first honest reply since Ashley walked in.

"Oh, Mia..." Ashley's less shaken by Shepard's bluntness than the hollowness of her tone, and she pulls Shepard into tight hug. "Even if you were, it doesn't change how I think of you."

Shepard smiles feebly into Ashley's shoulder, but shakes her head nonetheless.

They end up curled together on the sheets of Shepard's bed, Ashley's arm protectively slung around Shepard's shoulder. At some point, Shepard starts snoring. That's when Ashley finds the tension seeping from her muscles, belatedly realising she's been ghosting circles on Shepard's skin since, and without objection from the normally touch-averse woman cuddling her.

Times like this, Ashley often wonders what this means. Is this something more, or just Shepard being Shepard - her overtures nothing more than platonic?

When Ashley wakes tomorrow to find the sheets empty and the shower running, the sheer domesticity of it leaves a pang in her chest.

It's a future soldiers like them might never see.

_

You'd think that this war against the Reapers would've taught them to seize whatever chances they're given before it's too late, but that's assuming soldiers would prioritise themselves for once over the needs of the galaxy.

Shepard doesn't.

Shepard  _goddamn_  doesn't, Ashley laments, as she watches the woman sprint into the harsh whiteness of the Conduit beam.

Shepard's idea of love is to prop up those she loves while she sinks deeper underwater. Fatalistic. She muses about her death like outlining strategy, and Ashley can never talk her commander out of it.

_I'm tired, Ash. And this isn't a tiredness I can sleep away._

Ashley supposes she should've known, the moment they met on Eden Prime. Should've known the extent of sacrifice Shepard was willing to offer for those she loves. It would've saved her the heartache of growing to care for the damn saviour of the Milky Way.

A mistake, yes.

A regret, no.

Ashley cannot regret what they share, whatever it is. Not when she knows, her feelings as natural to her as breathing, that the times spent with Shepard - acerbic as her skipper is - have given her more peace than she's ever known.

So she stands hunched on the Captain's perch in the CIC, gloved fingers digging into the handrail and ears only filtering in feeds from around the Citadel. Her helmet's tossed aside and her hardsuit still caked with the dirt of their assault, but Ashley cannot rest. No, even Chakwas' quality medical care cannot help tamp down the one fear riddling holes in her chest.

When Shepard's hoarse voice fills a feed, it takes Ashley's last reserves to stop from sinking to her knees in relief there and then.

But little does she know that the resultant fizzle of Shepard's comm channel into silence is how a life is snuffed out. Once, and forever.

_

Two marines against Cerberus, Reapers and their miscellaneous monstrosities. What's not love? In a way, it's almost romantic, deserving of an equally romantic ending.

But there's nothing romantic about one point of their duality blazing out in Prothean fire.

_

Two points now collapse into one.


End file.
